


Lost Souls

by damozel



Category: New Tricks
Genre: Case Fic, Father-Daughter Relationship, Historical Murder Mystery, Multi, Murder Mystery, Yuletide, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-18
Updated: 2016-12-18
Packaged: 2018-09-09 15:10:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8896009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/damozel/pseuds/damozel
Summary: An anonymous tip-off leads to the discovery of a body. A young woman hangs her hopes on a mysterious charity. And Sandra and Jack experience revelations of their own as they attempt to discover the truth.Will the Lost Souls find some peace with the UCOS team on the case?





	1. Into the Woods

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lost_spook](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_spook/gifts).



Even Sandra was in disarray as they piled out of her silver Peugeot, stumbling over the uneven ground at the edge of Clairden wood. The chill early morning air was laced with droplets of water, and Sandra’s coiffed blonde mane was already plastered against her face. Her hastily applied mascara had started to run, and she was beginning to regret her last-minute choice of outfit: a sleek-fitting charcoal grey trouser suit that had felt _oh-so-right_ in the comfort of an Oxford Street dressing room. She winced as they made their way towards the bustling crime scene, complete with an ominous white tent and two officers in SOCO suits.

“What the bleeding hell is Strickland playing at?” grumbled Gerry, his arms tightly folded around his scruffy casual coat, his bottom lip protruding ever so slightly. “If he thinks I’m going in there he’s got another think coming.”

Sandra gritted her teeth behind her lightly lipsticked lips. “Come on lads,” she managed, with as much gusto as she could muster at such an ungodly hour, “look lively!”

“Hear, hear,” chirped Brian, following on from behind. He’d somehow managed to come armed with his Thermos, but at least Jack had been able to dissuade him from cycling to the scene. “You know I’ve been reading up on your hylophobia,” he continued, blissfully unaware of the foul look Gerry was shooting his way. “It seems like some good old-fashioned exposure therapy might work after all. There’s a psychologist in Santa Monica, Dr Austin Zhivago, who believes that — ”

“ — Exposure therapy my arse,” Gerry retorted, shrinking away from the trees. He rolled his eyes pointedly at Jack, who was walking alongside him.

“Strickland at 1 o’clock,” the former Chief Superintendent hissed back at Gerry. “Stand up straight for the headmaster now,” Jack added with a mischievous half-smile as the Deputy Assistant Commissioner bounded over to the UCOS team.

“Ah, good morning all,” boomed Strickland in cultured tones. It must have been something about his public school training that made him appear stiff, starched and pressed even in the middle of such a damp, chilling scene.

“Apologies for the somewhat early start,” he began, glancing at his watch as the minute hand crawled towards ten minutes past four. “Given that this case looks as though it will stray onto UCOS territory, I thought I’d bend the rules and bring you all in on the ground floor, so to speak.”

“Much appreciated, sir,” Sandra replied with just the faintest hint of sarcasm. “So what’s going on?”

“As I'm sure you've guessed, a body’s been found. What’s more surprising is that this was no random discovery by a passing jogger or dog walker. It seems that there was an organised dig under way, coordinated by a group who call themselves the ‘Lost Souls.’ They act on behalf of the families of missing persons, particularly where a relative insists that their loved one has been murdered. Apparently they have an army of volunteers all over the country who come out to dig through the night when one of their investigations is in hand.”

“Sounds like a fun hobby. And not the least bit creepy,” muttered Gerry. “I don’t suppose that charming looking fellow over there is one of this ‘Lost Souls’ bunch?”

“Just a local tramp as far as I know,” Strickland replied, glancing at the elderly-looking, crooked figure. A figure who gripped a dirty paper bag as if his life depended on it. Strickland took in the man’s orange knitted hat, his bedraggled hair and beard, and his grimy quilted overcoat. “I’ll look into it and ask one of the local officers to move him along,” the DAC promised, smoothing down his jacket and clearing his throat.

“Anyway, as I was saying, this ‘Lost Souls’ bunch are a legitimate charity as far as we’ve been able to establish. It’s not against the law to dig in the woods, and I’m told that they produced some positive results for the local force up in Doncaster last year.”

Gerry continued to look sceptical, pursing his mouth up.

“Now, for the past few months the London branch of ‘Lost Souls’ have been working with a young woman named Shauna Caffrey. Her father, Rowan, went missing seventeen years ago, and she claims to have proof that he was murdered, then buried out in Clairden wood.”

Jack winced involuntary at the thought of a child suffering such a loss. Strickland continued undeterred. “Late last night one of the volunteers hit upon the body, and until we get forensics back there’s not much more to tell.”

“Right then boys,” Sandra beamed, rubbing the palms of her hands together. “Sounds like we need to talk to this Shauna. Let’s get back to HQ and get things started.”

“At this hour?” Brian interjected. “When I’m starving and damn near frozzen.”

“Could do with another couple of hours kip,” Jack added with a twinkle.

“And a cuppa wouldn’t go amiss,” Gerry chipped in, adding to the chorus.

“Oh go on then,” Sandra conceded with a defeated pout, “I’ll treat us all to bacon butties.”

Beaten, the men began to head back towards the car.

“Oh, there’s just one more thing,” called the DAC, his eyes lingering over Gerry’s departing form for just a second too long. “The body. The lower right leg is missing.”

~o~ 

“Thank you for coming in to speak to us so promptly. I realise the past few hours must have been very difficult for you.” Sandra smiled warmly at the young woman on the other side of her desk just as Jack returned to the office carrying a warm cup of coffee, which he handed to Shauna Caffrey.

“Black with three sugars. That’s right isn’t it?”

“Yes, thanks,” she replied with a weak smile. She clasped the small cup close to her body; it was more a source of warmth and comfort than a beverage to be consumed. The veins on her pale hands stood out prominently, belying her twenty-one years, and her lank, mousy hair was pulled back into a high, tight ponytail, which she now started to fiddle with anxiously.

“Why don’t you start at the beginning?” Sandra suggested. “You can’t have been more than four or five when your father disappeared.”

“I was four,” replied Shauna in a faint voice. “I’d just started primary school and I can still remember dad dropping me off that first morning,” she added with a wistful smile. “He disappeared a couple of months after that.”

“And what precisely happened that day?” coaxed Sandra, leaning in and taking a swig from her own mug of coffee. “Do you remember anything specific?”

The frown-lines between Shauna’s eyebrows deepened as she pulled her hot drink towards her body again. “There’s nothing really. I’ve tried and tried to remember, to try to find something odd. But it was just an ordinary day. Dad was working as a chippy on a local building site back then. He went to work so early that I hardly ever saw him in the mornings. That day I must have needed the loo or something because I was up and about before dawn. I remember standing at the top of the stairs and watching him leave the house in his overalls, but I don’t think he even saw me.”

“And he didn’t come home that evening?” asked Jack.

“He was just...” Shauna’s voice cracked. “He was just gone.”

The room fell quiet for a moment or two. Sandra was the first to break the silence. “What did your mother have to say about it all?”

“She didn’t say anything.” Shauna’s expression switched from misery to anger in a matter of seconds. “She never told me anything about what went on. Only that dad was gone and never coming back. She’d burst into tears whenever I asked about him, so in the end I stopped asking. Anyway, she died a few years later — breast cancer — and that’s what landed me in care.”

“And that was it?” Jack shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “She never offered another explanation?”

“Well there was this load of old rubbish.” Shauna shoved a tatty piece of lined notepaper at the detectives. The crumpled note consisted of a handful of lines scrawled in blue biro. “Mum claimed it came from dad a few weeks after he left. It says that he’s found a new life and a new family, and that he needs to make a clean break.” Shauna brushed away the tear that was forming in her eye before it could drop. “I always knew it was a fake.”

Sandra took the note and dropped it into her desk drawer before continuing. “So when did you start to suspect that your father had been murdered?”

“I received a letter. It was last June, the day of my twenty-first birthday, and I still don’t know how they found me. I was in my first decent flat since leaving the system but hardly anyone had the address. I’d finally gotten myself sorted with a regular job, and I just wanted to keep my head down. There was no address or postmark, so someone must have pushed the letter through my front door. It wasn’t signed, but whoever wrote it told me that dad had been murdered and where to start looking for him. They said that I should destroy the letter straight away and get in touch with ‘Lost Souls.’”

“And did you?” asked Jack.

“Did I what?”

“Did you destroy it?”

Shauna nodded and Jack winced.

“That could have been a valuable piece of evidence,” said Sandra. “But there’s no point in worrying about it now,” she added as she saw the worried look on the girl’s face. “Is there anything else you can tell us that might help with our inquiry?”

“There’s only this.” Shauna pulled a crumpled photo from her pocket and flattened it out on the desk. The image was out of focus, but Sandra and Jack could make out the face of a dark-haired, curly-headed and moustached man dressed in a bright red Arsenal shirt. “That’s my dad. It’s all I’ve got left of him.”

~o~

“Bloody typical. Jack and Sandra are tucked up all nice and cosy in the office while we’re stuck out here on the set of South London’s version of the Blair Witch Project.” A large chunk of the woodland was still cordoned off, but that was little comfort to Gerry. “Coming back here now is about as useful as a chocolate teapot,” he grumbled, pushing his hands deep into his pockets. “The forensics boys will have been over the place with a fine tooth-comb. Sandra just enjoys making me sweat.”

“And you don’t think the men in white suits could have missed something?” Brian retorted, raising his wiry, overgrown eyebrows. He jerked his thumb at a rotting picnic bench that sat in a clearing just off the main path. “I fancy having a word with this fella for a start.” The drunk the team had spied earlier that morning was propped up against the bench, brown paper bag still in hand. “Anyone that hangs around a crime scene all day is suspicious in my book.”

“We’re with the Met,” announced Brian as he strode over to where the man was sprawled out on the ground, kicking several drained cans of Four Ex out of the way as he went. “Unsolved Crimes and Open Case Squad, UCOS to our friends.” He flashed his unimpressive-looking laminated ID at the tramp as Gerry caught up with him.

“Unsolved Crimes and Open Case Squad? Shouldn’t that be U-COCKS?” drawled the man, laughing from deep in his belly. “The boys in blue have already moved me on once today.”

“We’re not here to move you along,” Gerry put in, struggling to keep his face composed. The stench of booze, combined with the man’s filthy clothing, would have been enough to floor an elephant. “Might I ask to whom we have the pleasure of speaking?”

“They call me the Tree Man.”

Gerry looked as if he’d had just about as much as he could take for one day.

“All right Mr Treeman,” Brian interrupted before his friend could open his mouth and get them both into trouble. “Could you tell us what you were doing loitering around here in the early hours?”

“I came to see my friends. But the coppers weren’t having any of it.” The Tree Man visibly twitched before taking a swig from his paper bag.

“And which friends were these?” asked Gerry, leaning over the tramp.

“The badgers. The badgers of course! That bunch of nutters have been here for days, digging up their dens.”

“I appreciate your concern for the forest ecosystem,” returned Brian, straight-faced. “I have a fondness for nocturnal animals myself. But those volunteers were hunting for a missing body.”

“It’s not just the badgers,” continued the Tree Man, dismissing Brian’s words with a flick of his wrist. “It’s the fairies. What sort of effect do you think this sort of thing has on the fairy circles?”

Gerry rolled his eyes at his colleague. “So that’s the only reason you were hanging around here in the middle of the night? To protect the badgers, sorry _the fairies_ , from the dig?”

The Tree Man began to mutter under his breathe. It sounded like some kind of song or chant, but the only audible words were “fairy,” “badger” and “tree.”

“I think that’s everything we need from you for now, Mr, erm, Tree Man,” Gerry interrupted with an insincere smile, turning to leave. “Right, a swift pint’s on the cards after all that,” he announced, clapping Brian on the back. “And I’ll even get an orange juice in for my old mate here.”

“Thank you for your time,” Brian called over his shoulder, following his colleague back down the path. “I suppose there’s not much more to see,” he conceded, his eyes dancing over the crime scene one last time.

The sun had finally crawled out from behind the clouds, adding some much-needed warmth to the day. And the forest suddenly looked a little less foreboding with the sunlight bouncing off the foliage and the birds beginning to sing. There the Tree Man was left alone to his daydreams, lost in a drunken fog amongst the badgers, fairies and old bones.


	2. Family History

Sandra pushed her half-eaten packet sandwich to one side and took a swig of orange juice before standing up. She cleared her throat pointedly as she moved to the front of the room. The boys might have spent most of the morning complaining, and Gerry might have had one too many at lunch time, but her team were all ears now.

“Here’s what we know so far,” she began, pointing at Shauna’s grainy photo of her father, which was now pinned to the incident board. Rowan Caffrey disappeared the morning of December 19th 1995, then aged thirty-seven. As far as anyone’s been able to establish, he hasn’t been seen alive since then. But he could easily have made it to work that day, and that was most likely at a building site in the Kelham Road area. Moira Latham, his partner at the time, remained tight-lipped about the whole thing until the day she died, but their daughter, Shauna, does have a goodbye note that may or may not have come from Rowan.”

“Do we suppose he wrote the note before or after he had his leg chopped off?” smirked Gerry, who was leaning back cockily in his office chair, hands behind his head.

“We know next to nothing about the chain of events,” Sandra continued, shooting an irritated look in the east ender’s direction. “And as things stand, the only thing linking Rowan Caffrey to the body in Clairden wood is an anonymous letter that’s since been destroyed.”

“Bloody great coincidence if it isn’t him,” Jack interjected. “Can we really imagine that Shauna somehow got wind of the fact that there was a body buried out in the woods, and decided to fabricate the link with her dad? What would be the point? Anyway, she’d soon be found out.”

“True,” Sandra conceded. “And while we’ve got so little to go on we’ve got to be thinking about Moira Latham as a potential suspect. As well as any personal friends or work colleagues who we might be able to track down after all these years.”

“Isn’t this all just a waste of our time, guv?’ Gerry interrupted, swinging himself into the upright position. “It could be a dead end. And if forensics do confirm that the bones belong to Caffrey, Strickland will pass the case off to murder squad as soon as look at it.”

“Strickland assigned us this case and until such a time as that changes we’re going to give it everything we’ve got.” Sandra popped the lid off a black marker and wrote the words “Lost Souls” above an empty section of whiteboard, underlining the header twice. “For now Jack and I are going to see what we can get out of this so-called charity. I’d like to know what Shauna had to say to them when she first got in touch.”

She pulled on her overcoat, hunting in her pockets for her car keys, as Jack stood up to go.

“Brian, can you start looking into the family history? I want everything you can find on Rowan and Moira, before or after the disappearance.”

“Can do,” he replied, swivelling his chair around to face his computer.

“And Gerry, can you pull together a list of building sites in the area at the time. I want to know where Rowan was working in the weeks before he vanished, and the names of anyone who might have known him.”

“Righto ma’am,” he replied with a small salute. Planting his feet pointedly on top of his desk, he reached for a copy of the Thomson Local.

~o~

Jack and Sandra peered through the tall windows of Cathleen Firming’s ultra-modern, glass-fronted office.“Now she’s not your typical charity worker,” Jack muttered, “and she’s a bit young to be heading up an organisation like ‘Lost Souls.’”

“I suppose you still think I’m too young to be your boss,” retorted Sandra playfully, “but I seem to handle you just fine.” She knocked loudly on the office door, leaving behind an unsightly smear on the highly-polished glass. “It’s all about the people management skills.”

They watched the immaculately dressed young woman stand up, displaying her long, toned legs, which ended in a pair of obscenely high heels. “Perhaps she’s just got a good plastic surgeon,” whispered Jack. “From the looks of it, she’d be able to afford one.”

“You must be Detective Superintendent Pullman. I was told to expect you.” The charity director smoothed down her Chloé blouse and twisted a perfectly curled lock of strawberry blonde hair around her finger, making no attempt to hide her disdain at the sight of the female officer.

“Yes. And this is my colleague Jack Halford.”

“Charmed,” purred Firming, managing only a limp shake of the detective’s hand. Her wrist was weighted down with so much heavy jewellery that it was a wonder she could move it at all.

“Nice place you’ve got here,” Jack chipped in, offering a cursory handshake of his own before turning to admire the large, bright office. “And a nice central London location to boot.”

“Indeed we’re very fortunate. Our donors are generous people.” Firming glanced at her mobile phone, which was flashing and beeping ferociously. “Sorry about that.” She turned the ringer off, not looking in the least bit sorry. “I’m afraid the charity won’t run itself. I’ve got a busy afternoon ahead after the business up at Clairden wood. I suppose that’s why you’re here?”

“Naturally,” Jack replied, taking a seat without being asked. “But I expect you’re used to police involvement in your line of work?”

“Well, there was one case up in Doncaster,” she replied, wafting her hand vaguely in the air. “But we generally operate independently from the police. In fact most of our clients feel that they’ve been badly let down by your lot. It’s why they bring their cases to us in the first place.”

“So discoveries like the one your team made this morning aren’t all that common?” Sandra pressed, undeterred by the woman’s dismissive manner.

“As I’m sure you know, Detective Superintendent, Missing Persons cases are long, hard and slow. We do everything we can to achieve some resolution for our clients, but as a voluntary organisation our resources don’t quite match those of the Metropolitan Police.”

“And what about Shauna Caffrey?” asked Jack, shaking off Firming’s hostility like water off a duck’s back. “Did you work on her case yourself?”

“I did. She was referred to me via our helpline a few months ago. I think she’d read about our work online.”

“Really?” asked Jack, surprised. “We were led to believe that she’d received a letter instructing her to get in touch with ‘Lost Souls.’”

“There certainly was an anonymous tip-off,” replied Firming, fingering her elaborate wedding rings. “In fact that’s really all we had to go on. With the mother deceased, the trail was pretty cold. Then Shauna was _so_ convinced that her father was out in the wood. In the end I decided to go ahead and organise a dig. We generated some publicity about the case in the area, and eventually managed to get a team of volunteers together. Our dogs didn’t pick anything up when we took them out there last week, but one of the diggers must have got lucky this morning.”

“You weren’t at the dig yourself?”

“No, Detective Superintendent, I wasn’t. My role here is primarily administrative.” Firming’s mobile began to vibrate again. “Now, really, I must be getting on.”

“One last thing,” Jack cut in with his disarming smile. “What did you make of Shauna when she came to see you? How did she seem?”

“The same as all the others.” Firming tapped frantically at her phone as she spoke. “Anxious, distressed, and perhaps a little excited at the prospect of finally discovering the truth. That’s not uncommon.”

“And you had no reason to believe that she might be misleading you? There was nothing suspicious about her story?”

“Nothing at all, Mr Halford. Now if you don’t mind I’ve got to be at a meeting in Kensington in half an hour. Our receptionist will show you out.”

~o~

“Now that’s a cover operation if ever I saw one,” Jack huffed. His pint of bitter sloshed onto his hand as he manoeuvred himself into his usual seat, depositing Sandra’s large glass of white wine on the beer mat in front of her.

“Yeah, that uppity madam’s definitely up to no good,” Sandra fumed. “Charity-worker-Barbie’s got limited resources for Missing Persons, has she? Did you see that place?”

“I did.” Jack placed a calming hand over Sandra’s for a second or two. “You of all people should know that we can’t take these things personally.”

Sandra took a gulp of wine, then proceeded to stare angrily down at her glass.

“But it is personal, isn’t it?” Jack continued, taking her silence as his cue. “Shauna Caffrey lost her father when she was just a child after all.”

“Yeah, well it may yet turn out that we both lost dads who weren’t really worth the heartbreak.”

Her words hung heavily on the air as silence descended upon the pair.

“It used to break my heart that Mary and I never had a child of our own,” said Jack after a while. “But these past few years I’ve watched someone who’s like a daughter to me blossom into a remarkable detective, and a remarkable woman at that. So perhaps I didn’t miss out after all.”

Sandra continued to look down into the depths of her wine glass. Now her eyes were starting to fill.

Jack simply picked up his pint and settled back into his chair, staring placidly at Sandra through his clear blue, pink-rimmed eyes.

~o~

“David Llewellyn?” Gerry shouted over the rumblings of a temperamental concrete mixer.

“You’re speaking to him,” came the booming reply. The foreman, who was the size of Gerry twice over, stood on top of two stories worth of scaffolding, his extra-large, high-vis vest stretched tight across his bulging chest. “Who wants to know?”

“Gerry Standing. I’m with the Met. Would you mind coming down so I can have a quick word?”

“No problem,” Llewellyn shouted back as he ducked out of the way of a stray hanging bucket. “Fancy a brew? Old-fashioned builder’s tea is all we’ve got going I’m afraid.”

“I won’t keep you,” Gerry replied as Llewellyn reached street-level. “I’m only after a bit of information. I understand you’re the longest serving employee of Fineway constructions. I wonder if you remember a bloke who went missing from one of your sites about seventeen years back? Rowan Caffrey?”

“Bloody hell, that’s a blast from the past!” Llewellyn smiled, removing his yellow helmet and revealing his shiny, bald head. “I was only an apprentice bricky back then. But yeah, I remember Rowan. A carpenter, right?”

“That’s the one.”

“He was an odd sort of bloke as it happens. Nice enough to work with, but he definitely kept himself to himself. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was harbouring a secret or two.”

“Do you remember what happened to him?”

“Vaguely. It was a bit of a funny business – he just didn’t show up to work one day. That wasn’t that unusual back then. Us casual labourers were always ducking and diving from one job to another, all cash in hand I’m ashamed to say in front of an officer of the law. I heard months later that he’d done a runner on his missus, and I have to admit that I wasn’t all that surprised to hear it.”

“Oh. And why was that?”

“She was a handful. Maureen or Maura was it?”

“Moira. Moira Latham.”

“That’s the one. And a right little firecracker she was. Used to show up on jobs at all hours, shouting the odds at Rowan. She’d be demanding housekeeping, rent, you name it. They had a nipper too, I think.”

“That’s right. A little girl called Shauna. She ended up in care after her dad disappeared and her mum passed away.”

“I’m sorry to hear it,” said Llewellyn. “Of course I’m not saying that Rowan didn’t deserve a good talking to. I just wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t stick around to take the flack. Come to think of it, I reckon they had a big barney on site the day before he disappeared. It was just before Christmas, and Moira was shouting something about Rowan drinking away the money she’d saved up for presents for the little one.”

“That’s news to us, Mr Llewellyn,” Gerry replied with a wry smile. “Did you see either of them again after that?”

“Nah. There was a little Christmas do down our local that night, with the lads from the site. But that sort of thing wouldn’t have interested Rowan. The last I saw of him he was heading home for the day, happy as Larry.”

~o~

“It sounds like Moira Latham is on the fast-track to becoming suspect number one,” Gerry declared as he entered the office, depositing his coat on his desk. “David Llewellyn didn’t know much, but it certainly sounds like things were heading south between Moira and Rowan in the months before he disappeared. With Moira deceased, this case could be over before it’s begun.”

Brian continued to hammer away at his computer keyboard, roundly ignoring what was going on around him.

“Brian? _Brian_. Is anybody home?”

Brian came to as if he were waking from a trance. “Looks like you mightn’t need to bother tracking down that building site after all,” he announced.

“That’s what I’ve been saying,” Gerry sighed. “It’s a bleeding waste of time.”

“No. I mean. Come and look at this.” Brian jabbed his finger at a scanned document that was displayed on his monitor as Gerry came over to join him. “In 1990, Rowan witnessed a mugging on Kelham high road and came in to give a statement. It’s a bog standard witness statement,” Brian continued, still pushing his finger against the screen, “but look at the signature at the bottom.”

“He signed his own statement. So what?”

“As ever, Gerry, you look but you don’t see,” sighed Brian portentously. “Look at the handwriting. I’m no graphologist, but I’d say that’s a pretty good match with the farewell note that Rowan allegedly left behind for his wife and daughter.”

Gerry pulled his glasses from his top pocket and took a closer look. “If the note’s legit it means there was no foul play with Rowan’s disappearance. So we’ve been wasting our flipping...”

Gerry’s words were cut off as the telephone on Brian’s desk began to ring. Brian clumsily grabbed at the receiver, knocking his AFC Wimbledon coffee mug onto the floor in the process. “Unsolved Crimes and Open Case Squad, Brian Lane speaking.”

The office fell silent as the former Detective Inspector drunk in the words coming from the other end of the line.

“The forensic report is in then? Okay. Righty-ho. Good, good. You what? Over a hundred years old you say? I don’t believe it!”


	3. Old Bones

“So that's it then,” said Sandra with a scowl, “case closed.” She downed the remainder of her morning coffee, tossing the empty takeaway cup into the paper bin next to Brian’s empty desk. “According to forensics, the bones from Clairden wood are at least a hundred years old and probably more like a hundred and fifty. Unless he’s Dr Who, then they sure as a hell don’t belong to Rowan Caffrey.”

“Looks like it,” said Jack. “Although there are still one or two things that don’t add up if you ask me.”

“Where the hell are the other two?” Sandra demanded petulantly, ignoring her mentor’s words. “Just because the case is over it doesn’t mean they get the morning off.”

“I don’t know about Brian but Gerry’s in with Strickland,” replied Jack evenly. “We’d better watch our heads for flying pigs. Apparently he stayed behind late last night. And he came in early again this morning.”

At that moment Gerry Standing strutted into the outer office, puffing up his chest like the cock of the walk. Strickland followed closely behind him, looking unusually dishevelled. When the others weren’t looking, he subtly did up his flies.

“Looks like this case might not have gone completely Pete Tong after all,” began Gerry with a satisfied smile.

“Haven’t you heard?” snapped Sandra in frustration. “The bones aren’t his; the game’s up.”

“Not quite,” Strickland cut in. “After talking to you and Jack last night, Gerry got in touch with our friends over in forensic accounting. They’ve turned up one or two interesting things about Cathleen Firming and her band of bone collectors.”

“Oh really?” Sandra was all ears now.

Strickland continued. “It looks like Firming’s so-called ‘donors’ are actually her clients. Despite operating as a registered charity, with all the tax breaks that entails, almost all of the charity’s income comes from the families of the missing people that ‘Lost Souls’ claims to be able to track down. My guess is that they use the anonymous tip-off letters to lure in vulnerable marks. If the money is officially a ‘donation’ then the family have no way to complain when the investigation runs cold. I suppose that the digs are largely for press and publicity, only on a couple of occasions they’ve actually hit on something macabre.”

“Nice.” Jack’s sarcastic tone cut through the air like a knife. “Target a poor messed up kid like Shauna Caffrey and bleed her for all she’s got.”

“Quite,” replied Strickland. “I’ve organised for uniformed officers to head over there and arrest her asap. I don’t doubt that we’ll find more culprits once we launch a proper investigation into the sham charity. For a start, Mr Firming looks like a dodgy character, and it may be that the pair of them have pulled off cons like this before.”

“Wait. Hold on a minute,” Gerry interrupted as Strickland brushed past the incident board. “Where did this other photo of Rowan come from? That’s not the crummy old snapshot that Shauna brought in.” He snatched the second photo from the whiteboard, squinting down at it intently.

“Shauna sent it through,” Sandra replied sadly. “She found it online via one of her father’s schoolmates and thought it might help with the investigation. It’s of little use now, of course.”

Ignoring his boss, Gerry grabbed a black marker from Brian’s abandoned desk and began to scribble enthusiastically over the image of Rowan Caffrey’s face.

“Hey, what do you think you’re doing?” Jack protested, trying, and failing, to grab the pen from the overly excited east ender. “This isn’t your Sunday paper.”

“Remind you of anyone?” Gerry demanded in response, proudly holding up his handiwork. Rowan now sported an impressive beard and moustache, and a long, wild mane of hair.

“It doesn’t,” came Jack’s reply. Sandra’s face was also blank. Only Strickland showed any flicker of recognition. “Maybe?”

“That tramp out in the woods,” cried Gerry almost beside himself. “ _Rowan Caffrey is only the bloody Bird Man!_ ”

Strickland took the photo from Gerry. “Blimey, you’re right.” He cleared his throat awkwardly. “Poor, poor Shauna.”

“Poor Shauna indeed,” Sandra muttered in response, her frown-lines deepening for a second or two. It was obvious from the look in her eyes that her mind was racing ten to the dozen. “Guv, did you just say that you’d arranged for uniform to go over and arrest Firming?” The DS pressed the palms of her hands together, transforming her face into the picture of innocence. “Please boss. Let me be the one to do it.”

~o~ 

“I’d be a lot more pissed off with Brian right now if I hadn’t had such a _brillant_ morning.” Sandra dug into her pub lunch enthusiastically. “I just hope Strickers doesn’t start to wonder where we’ve got to.”

“Here’s to that,” echoed Gerry, tucking into his pint.

“I still don’t know what Brian’s doing,” Sandra continued through a mouthful of steak and ale pie.

“He’s on his way,” Jack offered. He stared at his new mobile phone as if it might explode at any minute. “He’s been sending me those text message thingies again.”

As if merely speaking of the devil had summoned him to the scene, Brian chose that moment to burst into the pub lounge, his bicycle helmet still strapped securely to his head.

“So I’ve heard about our friend the Bird Man,” Brian began, slotting himself in snugly between Gerry and Jack. “What I’d like to know is, what the bleeding heck was he doing hanging around a burial site all those years after the fact?”

“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind an answer to that one myself,” Sandra responded.

Jack cleared his throat authoritatively. “I’ve been giving this some thought. My best guess is that everything Moira Latham said to her daughter was true. Perhaps Rowan had a fancy woman on the side, or he simply decided that parenting a child was too much like hard work. Let’s face it, it doesn’t sound like he was much cop as a father. Is it really surprising that he had a roving eye?”

“But from the looks of him he’s not been living with a woman for the past decade and a half,” Gerry interjected. “And that doesn’t explain why he’d be loitering in the spooky woods near to his old house seventeen years after the fact.”

“We’re all capable of losing our way after a few bad decisions,” Jack continued serenely. “Something must have gone wrong at some point in the past decade and a half. And who knows if he can even remember his former life? Perhaps he simply heard about the dig for one ‘Rowan Caffrey’ in the local paper and the name sounded familiar? Of course it was bad luck for ‘Lost Souls’ that they actually stumbled across an old body. Then what bit of London woodland doesn’t harbour a dark secret or two?”

Jack looked rather pleased with him theory, but it was obvious that Brian had barely heard his words.

“So I expect you’ve all been sat here mulling over the other mystery of this case?” Brian’s vowel sounds always became more pronounced when he got over excited. He shrugged off his overcoat, and rolled up the sleeves of his home-knitted jumper. “Worry not. I’ve just spent a very productive morning in the British Library.” He pulled a large, folded photocopy from his inside pocket, and spread it out in front of his blank-faced colleagues. “It’s a report from the _Clairden Bell_ dated 9th November 1873.”

The three detectives each took in the words at their own pace, slowing realising the significance of what was laid out before them.

**ONE-LEGGED JOE – A MURDER MOST FOUL?**

> As will be well known to many of our loyal readers, on the 27th _instat_ stories began to circulate in the Kelham Road area regarding the fate of a less than wholesome character who is known only to local residents as “One-Legged Joe.” Many rumours have circulated regarding the cause of that gentleman’s particular affliction, and the circumstances surrounding the loss of his most vital appendage. “Joe” is known to law officials in connection with a string of petty crimes in the region, the most infamous being the massacre of a quantity of chickens and other livestock belonging to respected Clairden farmer Mr Alridge Aspinall following an alleged gambling dispute between the two. While foul play is by no means assured, the alarm was raised when Joe was absent for several days running from his usual spot at The King’s Arms. Certain items previously seen about his person have since been discovered in a hedgerow skirting the Clairden farmlands. Any individual with further knowledge of these matters is urged to contact the local magistrate or a police officer. 

“Blimey,” muttered Gerry as he finished reading, necking the remainder of his pint.

“My money’s on Aspinall as the one what done it!” Sandra declared.

“Aye, I’m with you there,” Brian agreed, “although of course we can never really be sure.”

“So here’s to ‘One-Legged Joe,’” Gerry proposed, holding up his glass.

“And to Shauna Caffrey,” Jack added.

“To Shauna Caffrey,” Sandra echoed. “Let’s hope that she can pull something positive out of this whole sorry mess.”

“And to UCOS, of course,” boomed Strickland as he entered the pub and marched over to their table with an indulgent smile on his face. “Cheers.”


End file.
